San Diego Opera: hoping for an encore

Final curtain saddens opera fans, employees

All cast and backstage crew members of the San Diego Opera wave to the audience during the final curtain call for the San Diego Opera after the final performance of Don Quixote at the Civic Theater in San Diego on Sunday.
Hayne Palmour IV

All cast and backstage crew members of the San Diego Opera wave to the audience during the final curtain call for the San Diego Opera after the final performance of Don Quixote at the Civic Theater in San Diego on Sunday.

SAN DIEGO, Calif.  With Sancho Panza’s final plaintive wail over the lifeless body of Don Quixote, the curtain rang down Sunday afternoon on the 49-year history of San Diego Opera.

The company is scheduled to shut down on April 29 and liquidate its $15 million in assets to pay creditors. But unlike the dead knight errant in Jules Massenet’s opera, San Diego Opera might still have a pulse.

At Sunday’s season-closing performance at the San Diego Civic Theatre, board members, donors, singers, company employees and subscribers all expressed hope that some vestige of San Diego Opera can be saved.

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During the curtain call to an extended standing ovation, more than 100 employees and backstage crew, many with tears streaming down their cheeks, joined the cast onstage, and many pointed up at the supertitles screen above the stage that read: “We are not giving up!

Eduardo Chama, the Argentine bass-baritone who played Sancho Panza, spoke passionately after the performance about the need to fight for the company’s survival.

“The biggest risk is not taking one,” he said. “The board members who don’t want to go on should resign and the board members with cojones can stay and make this thing work.”

It’s been a tumultuous month since the opera company’s board, citing a steady decline in donations and ticket sales, voted 33-1 on March 19 to shut down after the final “Don Quixote” performance. The decision was made, longtime General and Artistic Director Ian Campbell said, to “go out with dignity, on a high note with heads held high.”

The vote came as a shock to the company’s more than 400 full-time and seasonal employees, the San Diego Symphony (which plays at all performances) and board members who weren’t at the meeting. On April 1, the board agreed to extend the company’s lifeline for two weeks so a special committee, known as the White Knights, could be formed to explore options. Board member Carol Lazier pledged $1 million toward a renewal effort.

Wiping tears from her eyes after Sunday’s performance, Lazier said she’s deeply heartened by the outpouring of support from the more than 20,000 people who signed an online petition to save the company. And on Thursday, she will present to the board a reorganization plan prepared by officials of the trade group Opera America — who say San Diego Opera’s problems are fixable because the company has no debt and substantial assets.

British fashion designer Zandra Rhodes, who joined the board this year, said she’s excited by the “strength of spirit” the public and some board members have shown lately, and she hopes they’ll step up if the company is reformulated.

Ticket sales have fallen 15 percent since 2010, but since the closure announcement, tickets have become scarce. Sold-out signs were posted at the box office Sunday, and the shelves of San Diego Opera’s lobby gift shop were bare.

Nibbling a cheese plate during intermission, 20-year subscriber Anne Marie Ebeling of Del Mar said she was shocked by the closure announcement, but is holding out hope for a last-minute save.

“They’ve been doing grand opera for so many years, but maybe they can do opera that’s a little less grand,” she said. Sharing her table was fellow Del Mar opera fan Susan Pfleeger, an eight-year subscriber.

“If they can find a way to bring it back again, I would support it in a minute,” Pfleeger said.

Exiting the theater after the show, San Diego philanthropists (and San Diego Symphony saviors) Irwin and Joan Jacobs said they were emotionally moved when the employees came onstage at the end. When asked if he sees a future for San Diego Opera, Jacobs said simply, “We’ll have to see.”

Sunday’s grand finale had elements of the circus about it. Fans and employees were circling Civic Center Plaza wearing custom-made “Save San Diego Opera” stickers and T-shirts and handing out fliers about for a town-hall meeting that will take place at 4:30 p.m. Thursday in the San Diego Civic Concourse. Reservations are requested.

Also circulating in the plaza were sign-toting subscribers urging the ouster of Campbell and his ex-wife, Ann Spira Campbell, the company’s deputy general director. Their high salaries (which topped a combined $1 million in 2010) and the cash payouts they would receive upon liquidation, have infuriated critics.

Carrying a green sign that read “Get Rid of Ian,” 14-year subscriber Phyllis Daugherty called Campbell “a disgrace to San Diego” and said he should quit and leave the company to someone with fresh ideas.

At the opening performance of “Don Quixote” on April 5, Campbell was jeered during a preshow curtain speech. He didn’t speak Sunday and stayed backstage during and after the performance. Italian conductor Edoardo Müller, whose 31-year association with San Diego Opera ended in 2011, sent a letter to board members Sunday morning describing Campbell as self-serving.

“When a ship is to be wrecked, the captain should be the last one to leave and save himself,” Müller wrote. “The general director, unable to solve a difficult situation, decides to murder San Diego Opera with all its employees, in order to save his honor?”

But bass-baritone Chama defended Campbell, who ran the company in the black for decades and created a welcoming environment for singers.

“He ran a great company for 30 years, the board should pay Ian what he deserves,” Chama said.

Italian bass-baritone Ferruccio Furlanetto, who played the windmill-tilting Don Quixote, has a long history with with San Diego Opera. When he took a solo curtain call immediately after the opera's finale Sunday, Furlanetto dropped to one knee, kissed his hand and pressed it to the stage, which has been his artistic home for 29 years.

With just two weeks now left on the clock, opera employees were tearful, angry, reflective and resolute after Sunday’s performance.

Resident conductor Karen Keltner, a 34-year employee, said she kept her emotions in check while leading the orchestra through “Don Quixote,” but the when the curtain came down, so did her tears.

Bass-baritone Chris Stephens, a school vice principal who has sung with the opera’s chorus for 15 years, described the letdown after the show as “horrible.”

“Everybody’s going through a grieving process. Some can’t talk about it without breaking down,” he said. “If you’re a singer, this is your major source of income, so many people are talking about moving to L.A.”

Soprano Priti Gandhi gave up her singing career in January to join the company as its incoming artistic administrator. Next year would have been the Del Mar resident’s 20th year associated with the company.

“I never thought I’d be on this sort of journey,” Gandhi said. “I hope I get to celebrate a 20th anniversary next year.”

The end has been especially hard for married staffers John David Peters and Mary Yankee Peters. John has been the company’s production carpenter for 45 years and stage manager Mary has called the cues for every opera performance for the past 25 years.

“This is a mortal wound,” John Peters said. “For the first time in my life, I’m waking up in the morning and don’t want to get out of bed. I want to hide from the world.”

“We never saw this coming and it’s devastating,” Yankee Peters said. “We’re John David and Mary of San Diego Opera. That’s our identity. Who are we without the company?”

Keturah Stickann had planned to leave San Diego after stage directing "Don Quixote," but when she heard about the the shutdown, she decided to stay and attended all but one show of the run. Stickann said she's been so impressed by the bravery and fighting spirit shown by staff and supporters in the past few weeks.

In a strange way, Stickann said the shutdown announcement may be just the spark that San Diego Opera needs to transform itself into a new company that can carry on well into the future.

"Making art is like making fire," she said. "People here had lost the fire and this experience has reignited the flame."